Monday, September 29, 2014

Hi gals. I have a lot of nail polish, so much in fact, that some of them are not receiving the love they deserve. So I went through my stash today and decided that my readers should get in on the polishes I have in my stash, that I've never used.

So I've created two prize packs for my readers and set up a Rafflecopter giveaway so that my lovelies I've never used will find a new home where my readers will hopefully give them the love they deserve!

So let's get on to the prize packs shall we?!?

Prize Pack #1 is the Shade Shifting Nail Polish set!

This polish set includes China Glaze Want My Bawdy, Butter London Knackered, China Glaze Rainbow, Pretty Serious Galaxy Invader and China Glaze Rare and Radiant. All of these polishes are duochrome and create shade shifting loveliness!

Prize Pack #2 is Everything That Glitters Nail Polish set!

This polish set includes Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Twinkle Toes-ty, Essie Jazzy Jubilant, Jindie Nails Rave and ORLY FX Rockets Red Glare! These are all pretty glitter polishes that I never used but would be perfect for the impending holiday season!!!

This giveaway is for US residents only. Sorry international ladies. But if you have a US friend that will mule it to your country for you, by all means enter. I just need a US address to send it to!

So here are the details of the giveaway below! Good luck fellow readers!

I own quite the collection of a-England polishes and awhile ago I thought they weren't getting the right amount of love! So I pulled out Lady of the Lake and decided to do a nail art look with it.

I am truly in love with nail vinyls, they really make doing fun things like chevrons super easy. And it's a quick easy way to get a nice finished nail art look.

a-England Lady of the Lake is a beautiful scattered purple holo. I thought it was very regal and royal looking so I paired it with Zoya Ziv, a beautiful gold foil nail color. Because the gold foil make Ziv look a little textured, I don't think this manicure looked as good as it could. I think it might have been paired better with a smooth metallic gold to match the soft look of Lady of the Lake.

To give the look a little more depth I alternated the directions of the single chevron and made accents of the opposite colors.

You can purchase nail vinyls at a number of indie nail polish companies, I recently got a variety pack from NailVinyls.com, which is where these single chevrons came from.

So far I've only done single chevrons, lightening bolts, lines and regular chevron designs, but there are a lot of super cute nail vinyls out there. What are your favorite nail vinyls?

Friday, September 26, 2014

So we all know I am a fan of holo polishes, a real big fan. I just really love rainbows, they show the beauty of all colors at one time. Anyway, so browsing various nail blogs I kept seeing these AMAZING swatches of Painted Polish's Drunk on Holo. After seeing Sarah Lynn's nail art featuring it, I was done for. I knew I needed to have it!

Drunk on Holo is a silver holographic polish with so much bling. I can't even describe to you how much bling this polish has. It is packed full of small holographic glitter in a clear base. For this manicure I think I used three coats for ultimate bling, but two coats would be fine I think.

Because the rainbow showed some fun pastel colors, I decided to add some pastel colors to the manicure!

I used single chevrons from NailVinyls.com, and then added OPI You're Such a Budapest and Essie Mint Candy Apple. I think the colors matched the holo beautifully.

But seriously, there is so much you can do with Drunk on Holo, I haven't even explored all the possibilities yet. Painted Polish restocks about once a month, but you'll have to stalk her via her Instagram or Facebook to find out when the next restock is. I promise you it will be worth it!

What do you think of my pastels paired with holo? What are your favorite polishes to pair with silver holographic polishes?!

Wednesday, September 24, 2014

So all over the internet I've been seeing all these wonderful galaxy nails. Well I had never attempted it, but a few weeks back I was inspired Jessica at Be Happy and Buy Polish's fabulous galaxy nails, I decided it was finally time to give the look a try.

I obviously haven't perfected the stars on top of the galaxy, but I actually liked the final product! They were beautiful!

I started out with a base of Zoya Storm and then used a makeup sponge to apply ILNP Summer Stargazing, ILNP Bikini Bottoms and Colors by Llarowe Feelings Whoa Whoa Whoa – blue, pink and purple holo polishes.

After I finished that I applied China Glaze Fairy Dust, because Fairy Dust All the Things! Fairy Dust makes everything better and covers a multitude of sins. After the Fairy Dust, I attempted to make stars of different sizes, via the white dots, but well, I guess that was a little much. Either way I really liked how these nails turned out.

It's worth it to try new nail art. There is so much inspiration out there, the possibilities are endless! What new technique have you tried lately? Have you tried galaxy nails? Share them with me on my Facebook page!

Monday, September 22, 2014

First off I'd like to say I'm sorry I keep forgetting to blog on Fridays. My intent every week is to blog Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, problem is, by Fridays I get pretty swamped in life. Fridays are deadline day at work and so my life gets a little hectic. If I don't pre-blog on the weekends, I get overwhelmed and I'm sorry about that guys!

Anyway, I've pushed up my order of posting this week to show you this amazing polish I got in the mail this weekend. Check out Smitten Polish Out of the Darkness.

Out of the Darkness is a charity polish Smitten created especially for Suicide Prevention month. Here is what Noelie, the genius behind Smitten, has to say about the polish.

"Smitten is
doing a special charity polish this month for Suicide Prevention Month.
Suicide prevention is a cause that is very, very important to me on a
personal level, and it means a lot to me to be in a position to lend
awareness to the fact that mental illness is real. It's affected my
family. It affects LOTS of families, and lots of people. The suicide
prevention hotline number is 1-800-273-8255. It’s my hope that this
number might be useful to people who are struggling, whether it's the
person buying the polish or someone they care about. The charity polish
is called Out of the Darkness. It’s a purple jelly base with turquoise
and purple holo microglitters (the suicide prevention colors), along
with teal to purple color shifting glitters. $6 from each bottle sold in
the month of September will be donated to the American Foundation for
Suicide Prevention (www.afsp.org)."

Update:Since Noelie had some supply issues in September, she is extending her offering of the polish through the month of October for Depression Awareness Month. She will be relisting it on the website as soon as her shipment of bottles has arrived. As of Friday, she has raised $552!

The minute I got this under the light, I was amazed! This polish is a smorgasbord of glitter sparkle. I see teal, purple, holographic all suspended in a beautiful royal purple jelly polish.

In many lights this polish had a glowy blurple look, but always you could see the amazing sparkle!!!

The photo above is under my kitchen light, doesn't neccesarily look this purple in real life. Honestly, none of these photos can really do this polish as much justice as it deserves! This is a beautiful polish, I hope these photos convey just how gorgeous and unique this sparkle is.

Application: This polish dries very quickly, but is so packed with glitter that it is almost textured. It also dries very matte. Because of all the glitter, this polish is top coat hungry. I used two coats of KBShimmer Clearly on Top for these photos.

Where to Purchase: As soon as Smitten gets its bottle supply, the polish will be listed at the Smitten Website. Follow them on Facebook for more updates. I purchased this polish for $11. While you are on the website, take a look around. Smitten is one of my favorite indie brands.

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

So earlier this summer I went on a fun girls weekend down to visit my best friend in Calabasas. She was house sitting for one of her clients, who live in a posh house complete with pool in the lovely celebrity-laden enclave of Calabasas.

Anyway, I wanted to put together some fun nails for the occasion, so this is what I came up with!

For this manicure I used China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy, which is an amazing neon coral polish that is so bright, no camera can capture its amazing color.

For the accent fingers I broke out Colors by Llarowe Aliens & Outlaws. Aliens & Outlaws is a black and holo microglitter concoctions. I used four coats, but I think you could get away with just three for full opacity.

For the stamping image, I broke out one of my new MoYou London stamping plates. For this manicure I used ProPlate 08!

Overall this manicure was super fun, bright, summery and perfect for the occasion of a girls' weekend! Unfortunately, neon polishes and China Glaze on me, never last long and I had a huge chip on one of my Flip Flop Fantasy Fingers. Oh well, it happens!

Monday, September 15, 2014

Hey guys, I've been pretty swamped at work lately. Life has been all sorts of busy and I've been lacking in the post department. I'm going to say I'm sorry now this will be a quick post!

Today I am sharing with you Indigo Bananas Reign, from their late summer collection.

Reign is a raspberry gelly polish with iridescent flakies!

Because I can't leave well enough alone, I stamped two images from my MoYou London Scholar 02 plate. I like this plate, bun unfortunately I find many of the images too large for my nails. :(

Application: This went on great in three thin coats. The flakies do not stick up at all and do not give you any troubles during application.

Where to purchase: You can purchase Indigo Bananas polishes from their website,
I bought this mini bottle (8ml) for $7.25. I really like their shop
because you can purchase mini polishes or large polishes, which is a
great way to sample a new-to-you indie polish maker.

That's it for today folks, sorry this was such a quick post. I promise I'll put more into this as my life gets less crazy!

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Well friends, I had just about the worst day ever yesterday. Got rear ended on the way to work, and had back-to-back-to-back-to-back meetings at work. I'm currently feeling a little over extended in life, too many commitments making things rather stressful.

But one thing I like to come back to is this blog, because it deals with the things that make me happy – nails! No matter how hectic my life gets with election season, editorial duties etc. I know I can always look down at my nails and smile.

Today I'm sharing with you some blue skittle nail art I did awhile back. It seemed earlier this year I couldn't get my hands on enough blue holo polishes. I finally realized I had a ton when I put them all side by side (to make sure they weren't dupes) and thought they might make interesting skittle nails!

The polishes I used, from thumb to pinky, Colors by Llarowe Chillin' in Paradise, Color Club Over the Moon, Colors by Llarowe Soccer Mom, Colors by Llarowe Surf My Wave and ILNP Summer Stargazing.

Because I loved all the blue and it made me think of the ocean, I added a wave stamp on top to complete the look. For the stamp I used MoYou London Sailor 03 plate!

All of them had a great holo finish. Soccer Mom was a bit more of a scattered holo and dried a little textured (top coat fixed that pretty quick)! The holo in Surf my Wave, Over the Moon and Chillin' in Paradise were all very similar – linear and vibrant. The finish in Summer Stargazing was a different type of holo, scattered and linear at the same time.

I'm not going to lie, I think Color Club Over the Moon and Colors by Llarowe Chillin' in Paradise were VERY close and if you own one, I can say with confidence, I don't think you need the other. They weren't exact dupes, but pretty similar.

So that's it for my post today. I guess you can say this was apt timing for this manicure, because I'm currently feeling a little blue with how much stuff is going on in my life right now. Overwhelmed! How do you guys deal with stress? I typically paint my nails, when I can fit in a manicure! Something about switching off the really thoughtful side of your brain and just concentrating on art, on a tiny canvas is very relaxing! Don't you think?

Monday, September 8, 2014

So as I am getting older, I attend less and less weddings! It's somewhat of a relief, as I remember summers where I was going to one every other weekend.

Earlier this summer my husband and I had the pleasure of attending a wedding, and I feel like it just might have been the first wedding we attended where neither one of us were actually in the wedding – which is bliss. No need for a fancy bridesmaid dress or tux or a fuss about your appearance. No showing up early, making sure things are on schedule – just attend, enjoy your meal and have some fun.

My husband and I at the festivities!

Us with the lovely newlyweds!

Anyway, so today I am sharing with you the nails I sported for said wedding!

Since this was an outdoor wedding, I decided to go for a floral theme. I went to my recently purchased pile and pulled out Different Dimension Garden Goddess and then picked out a floral stamp to go on top.

Garden Goddess' formula was a little on the thick side, but it wasn't so much so that it was difficult to work with. The holo finish in it is a little weaker than some holo bombs I sport, but it is subtle and I think it's beautiful.

I stamped using MoYou London Pro Plate 06. I used Essie Hip-Anema, which is an orange-leaning red creme polish to stamp with. Was hoping it would go well with my coral dress.

Where to purchase: You can purchase Different Dimension polishes at their shop on Etsy. I believe I purchased this polish at Llarowe for $13.

So I hoped you liked my wedding nails today guys! What nails and designs do you typically sport for weddings? Do you do different designs for outdoor weddings or indoor weddings? Share with me you wedding nail tales!

Thursday, September 4, 2014

Hello everyone! Today I have a spectacular polish to share with you from Dance Legend. Different View is a multichrome chameleon with a stunning holo finish.

Different View is from Dance Legend's Holodays collection which has a linear holo finish from scattered holo particles.

This polish has a purple to green shift, which leaves it looking unique in any type of lighting.

The holo particles are in scattered foil pieces, which look silver in the shade, above, but out in the sun it is mega holo amazingness!

At sunset I checked out the nails again and the green was really showing strong! I feel like the green in this is an olive color with the purple having a more bright and vibrant feel.

Overall, this polish is just amazing and delivers on so many fronts: Holo? Check! Multichrome? Check! Unique? Check!

I guess I really just love polishes that look different every time I look at them, I guess that is why this polish is called "Different View," because it's a different experience every time you look at them!

Application: Even though the scattered holo pieces can make this polish look a little textured, this polish went on smooth in three thin coats. Two would have been fine, but I wanted an ultimate shift so I added an extra coat for good measure. I topped it with a coat of HK Girl Top Coat.

Where to Purchase: I purchased this polish at Llarowe, a US stockist for Dance Legend, a Russian Nail Polish brand. It came in a 15 ml bottle and retails for $13. And good news! This polish is currently available at Llarowe! The enabler in me says you should purchase this stunner right away!

Extra note: Sorry I only posted twice this week, still adjusting back to regular life after my lengthy trip I returned from last week. Next week should be business as usual – Monday, Wednesday, Friday!

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Today I have a lovely multichrome holo polish to share with you. This is Liquid Sky Lacquer Wink ^.~ which is a light blue holographic polish which has flashes of light green as well.

In the shade and in the sun, the green flashes are bright and amazing. I truly loved the colors in this multichrome.

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Just check out that green glow in the shade, above. So unique.

This polish is right up my alley. Reminds me of the ocean so I thought I would add some fish stamping to perfect the look.

To stamped I used Zoya Edie and MoYou London Sailor 04 plate.

Application: I really liked this polish. It went on great in three thin coats. I topped this with HK Girl Top Coat. I couldn't stop staring at this polish, it looked light blue, then light green! It had a gorgeous shift and the holo was super strong in the sunlight!

Where to Purchase: I purchased this polish from Liquid Sky Lacquer's website in the mini 7 ml size for $6.25. I really like the Liquid Sky Lacquer brand, they have so many different types of polishes – something for everyone and you can buy full size or minis on most of them which is great.